Buffalo's Opportunity

The people who make up this market are more sophisticated than other travelers. They’ve traveled more. They’ve been exposed to more places and more things than other travelers. They are more discerning. And not incidentally, they are higher-end, more up-scale, bigger spending tourists. They seek out real places and then they spend more time there, and they spend more money. That’s important.

But economics is not the only reason why we would should preserve and develop our heritage resources. Their greater value, perhaps, is for the people of the communities in which they exist. The same real places that have power for tourists have power for local residents, as well.

There is an important role for these places in the education and cultural development of everyone who lives here. All of these building sites, landscapes, and regions help tell the stories about how a community grew and developed, about who you are as a community. These things need to be preserved, interpreted and celebrated for their own sake, for you and all your neighbors.

There is, related to these broader developments, a growing interest in archaeology, which has some relevance for your situation here. Somehow, people today are captivated by archaeology of whatever vintage, from ancient sites to relatively recent industrial places.

This isn’t necessarily a new phenomenon. There was a great upwelling of interest in archaeology in the 19th century. Napoleon’s trip to Egypt triggered a revival of interest in ancient Egyptian sites and relics. Americans in a democracy that was still relatively new were interested in the ruins, as well as the ideas, of the ancient Greeks.